“The same-sex marriage movement has drained a lot of resources from other issues that are important to LGBT people,” says Kenyon Farrow, Executive Director of Queers for Economic Justice (QEJ), a community-organizing, advocacy and research organization that focuses on helping low-income and working-class LGBT New Yorkers, especially in the areas of housing and public benefits like welfare. Though Farrow, 35, came to New York to be an actor, after volunteering in 2006 at a resume-writing workshop for LGBT homeless, he found his calling as a community organizer to help empower the sometimes powerless members of his community.

“QEJ and other organizations like ours are made up of people that the mainstream movement long [ago] forgot.”

“It’s a myth that most donations to nonprofits come from the wealthy. They [actually] come from lots of people giving $10, $25, $100 at a time,” says the Bed-Stuy resident. “We know from the Obama campaign what a lot of small donations can add up to.” By donating just $10 per month to the seven-year-old QEJ, Farrow says, you can provide food and transportation for their groups in the shelter system. “We have a very real crisis of LGBT homelessness in New York,” the Cleveland native points out. “But where are the massive rallies for that?”